Kvifor KRLE? Forhandling og forståing av føremåla for det norske religions- og livssynsfaget i læreplan og lærebøker

There are many perceptions of and priorities for religious education (RE), both in Norway and across Europe. Norwegian RE is called upon to simultaneously promote national values and facilitate intercultural education. I explore how this is negotiated in and between, first, the national curriculum and a selection of RE textbooks, and then in the ongoing curricular revisions (20172020). While the outgoing curriculum stresses identity and heritage, the textbooks promote diversity and tolerance. Thus, the textbook authors appear to rely on more recent, international academic developments rather than the political priorities of the national curriculum, in what Oddrun M. H. Bråten has called a bypass. These developments are also prominent in the curricular revisions, but traces of the heritage-discourse remain. Hence, the new national curriculum is not a fundamental shift from the previous one, but it strengthens the notion of RE as intercultural education, in line with the views expressed in the RE textbooks